Hour 3

Measuring bandwidth, advertising one's own content, the difference between QLED and OLED, troubleshooting a dual boot machine after an update, installing a caller's VPN, is a 5G phone a good purchase and more of your calls!

Guests

Audience Questions

Audience QuestionsHour 1

Travis wants to know how he can measure his bandwidth to see if he's getting what he's paying for. Leo says that Windows 10 has a bandwidth monitor built-in, but that will only measure what your machine is using. Modern routers also have bandwidth monitors, but if you've been given a router by your ISP, it likely won't. That's why Leo always recommends buying your own router. He recommends the Ubiquity Edge Router X. And you won't be paying a rental fee on that gear either.

Audience QuestionsHour 2

Paul wants to know more about Mesh Routers and Internet of Things, but is concerned about security. Leo says that if you stick to main brands like Eero and Netgear, they will keep their firmware updated for security purposes. Leo recommends the Eero. But you may have to pay a monthly security subscription, which Leo hates.

Mitch wants to know the difference between OLED and QLED. Leo says there's a huge difference and QLED is just a marketing ploy by Samsung to lure those interested in OLED to their LED TVs. It uses "quantum dot" LEDs, which are very small. OLEDs are organic LEDs, which can be brighter.

Tom wanted to learn Linux, so he loaded up Linux on his PC. After a month, Windows now wants to install a feature update 1903 and now he's lost a partition. Leo says that Windows is being "bossy," thinking that it's the only OS you should have. So it "clobbers" your boot record and causes a boot-up issue. It's a common, yet complicated issue. You need to have a boot manager to sort it all out. Leo recommends GRUB. It gets loaded first and then asks you which OS you want to use. Most likely, the update redid the master boot record, damaging it. You should be able to bypass the boot manager in the BIOS and go directly to Windows. Once you get Windows booted, then you can start over. Then you can run a boot manager like GAG to fix it.

Leo recommends bypassing dual boot systems and either choosing one or the other or running it virtually.

Audience QuestionsHour 3

Karen wants to know if putting a VPN on her router would keep her secure. Leo says that it would encrypt stuff in your network, but in order to get your traffic encrypted going out, you need to have the software on your desktop. Leo likes to use the Tiny Hardware Firewall VPN because it's in between your computer and the outside world. It's a great way to go.

William is blind and uses a screen reader for his computing, He uses JAWS, but has also used NDVA. But he's having issues subscribing to TWIT's audio feed. Leo says that he'll have his web guy fix the header levels for subscribing.

Edward is a long-time listener who is legally blind. He has the iPhone 6+, and he's looking at the new iPhone 11. Leo says that Edward will love it, but the biggest annoyance is no headphone jack. That's still crazy. Will the iPhone 11 be 5G? Leo says no. It's not. But that's OK, 5G really won't be widespread until 2021. So if you want 5G, Samsung's Galaxy 10 is the way to go. But just because you can get 5G, you may not get 5G in your neighborhood. 5G is extremely limited because it takes four times the cellular coverage. So right now, it's just marketing (LYING). 5G isn't really a technology. It's just the next generation of the wireless spec. So you're not losing anything right now by not having it. Leo says that LTE is still really fast and you're not going to get anything with 5G that you don't already have.

Nooru has a laptop that is overheating. Will a cooling pad work and is there one that is self-powered? Leo says that most of them are powered by the USB port in your laptop. But will also plug into a USB adapter that plugs into the wall. Everyone who has a mobile phone has a USB adapter AC plug. So all you need is a cable long enough to do it. Another option is to use a portable USB power bank. You can then just attach that to the back of your cooler and it'll run for days. Any particular brand? Leo says no. They're all pretty much made by the same company in China. So anywhere you can buy them. But don't spend more than $15. Leo recommends Alibaba. It'll take a while to get to you, but they sure are inexpensive.

Jeff is having issues with his WiFi coverage at his studio. Leo says that congestion is a major problem with WiFi because of the Internet of Things, phones, tablets, the works. What Leo recommends is Powerline Networking. It's gotten a lot better the last few years and being wired will always be better than WiFi. So check it out. TPLink makes some great PLN devices.

This Week in Tech News

Fans are upset that actor John Krazinski has sold his YouTube web series Some Good News to CBS after a furious bidding war. Why are they upset? Because Krazinski isn't going to be continuing as the anchor of the popular youtube series. Many fans are now complaining that Krazinski has sold out. But Leo says that Krazinski is a TV and Movie star, and director, with a lot of other commitments on the horizon. But will SGN thrive without him? Leo isn't so sure.

Moving towards a more autonomous computer-oriented news curation, Microsoft this week laid off all their editors and writers for Microsoft News. Leo says that the news site isn't going away, Microsoft is just going to rely on an artificial intelligence algorithm to curate the stories it posts. Leo also adds that both Apple and Google have gone the other way, believing that human curation increases engagement. Leo also says that Facebook is also relying on an algorithm, and its news page is just terrible.

Leo says that while algorithms are good for optimizing your end result, they can get more extreme and just plain weird.

After a rain delay on Wednesday, SpaceX is poised to launch its first manned mission to the International Space Station with DM-2. Leo says that while critics say that money shouldn't be "wasted" on space exploration, Leo disagrees, saying that a tiny fraction of the federal budget goes to NASA and the Commercial Space Program, and the benefits of what we learn far outweigh what we spend, or the risk. And it always has.

Twitter announced this week that their employees can work from home and don't ever have to come back to the office. Leo says that this could be a new emerging trend, where companies allow ther employees to telecommute. The result could also be that people will be able to live where they can afford, rather than living in expensive areas. But it may also mean that companies will pay their employees less if they live in cheaper areas. But companies are also battling for the best talent, by offering amenities. Working from home will be part of that.